Saturday, February 13, 2016

10 ways MOOCs have forced Universities into a rethink

MOOCs have made us think. As one of the most fascinating developments in higher education in my lifetime, they are,in many ways, a pioneer of a more ‘open’ spirit
in learning. I’d contend that MOOCs, for all their promises and faults, have
been at their most effective in forcing a rethink
in Higher Education.

1. Rethink demand

MOOCs have uncovered huge demand beyond what the traditional
University system has to offer. They are a solution to a demand problem, which
seems to be growing, rather than shrinking. With over 4550 MOOCs, with around 200
added every month and getting on for 40 million enrolments, demand grows and supply follows. The simple truth is that we have moved beyond the early adopter phase (discussed here) where only those in the know knew about MOOCs, hence the graduate profile, to a wider audience, that includes school students and those in work, retirement and so on. This has, I suspect, come as a surprise to those in Higher
Education, who assumed that they were, in the past, satisfying demand.

2. Rethink curricula

The evidence over the last 3-4 years suggests that there is
greater demand for courses at the vocational, than academic end of the
spectrum. This is not to say that humanities and other forms of liberal arts
courses are not in demand, just that MOOCs have shone a spotlight on the real
fuel mixture of real demand, which is more practical than most predicted. In my
view, this suggests one of two things; that the balance of University courses
is wrong or that the vocational sector has suffered as funding has been sucked
up into the academic University sector. I suspect that both of these are true.
In any case, we have seen a huge demand for courses that satisfy not only
educational but career demand, especially business, IT, teaching and
healthcare.

3. Rethink structure

MOOC courses initially followed the existing semester model
of up to ten weeks, drip-feeding content, with a largely linear curricular
structure. Universities find it difficult to deal with shorter courses, more
asynchronous learning and less linear course delivery but MOOCs have moved in
this direction. We also see courses with looser, more collaborative and open
structures. The very concept of a course is, in a sense, being redefined by the
variety of MOOCs that has emerged. Note that the old xMOOC-cMOOC distinction is
all but dead (discussed here), as the sheer spectrum of MOOC types has expanded.

4. Rethink pedagogy

No one puts one-hour lectures up on MOOCs. The evidence
shows that they don’t work, that people lose attention and that there is
nothing in the psychology of learning that says they are even near the mark in
terms of efficacy. MOOCs eschew long-form lectures for shorted episodes and a
more mixed selection presentation. MOOCs, I suspect, have already pushed many
institutions to rethink, not only their length, whether they should be recorded
and the very nature of the lecture as their primary pedagogic form. There are
many other pedagogic issues that are being rethought around types of resources,
media mix, active learning and collaboration.

5. Rethink assessment

MOOCs have forced a rethink on what it is to assess, as well
as assessment techniques. A range of assessments are being tried, including
statements of completion, statements of attainment, through to fully proctored,
online examinations. On techniques, they have moved us beyond the standard
‘lecture-essay’ model to a range of online assessment techniques; peer assessment,
machine marking, automated essay marking, online proctoring, typing pattern
recognition, face recognition and so on.

6. Rethink
accreditation

Georgia Tech and Udacity deliver an online computer science
master’s program with 3,000 students, compared to the campus’s 300 students and
projections are heading towards 10.000. ASU with edX, the American Council on
Education, Charter Oak State College, and MIT offer accredited MOOCs. We are
already seeing the expansion of accreditation beyond institutional degree
awards toward, micro-accreditation through badges and other forms of certification.
The University of Derby had a 35.6% completion rate on their ‘Dementia MOOC’
and put some of this success down to their badging of each of the six sections
and a badge for completion.

7. Rethink technology

Online learning is not just MOOCs. There was and is a huge
range of online learning approaches from search, reference, informal,
e-learning, collaborative, adaptive, simulations and so on. May Universities
were using these technique before MOOCs came along and many continue to do so.
What has happened is an increased focus on digital strategy, especially by
leaders in these institutions who have had to create digital strategies. Even
at faculty level, few academics can afford to ignore the simple fact that every
students, researcher and teacher uses the internet as a fundamental tool. For
some, such as ASU, University of Edinburgh, Delft University and many more, it
is reshaping the very nature of course delivery at undergraduate and Masters
level.

8. Rethink cost

A common question when MOOCs are mentioned is, “How do you
monetise MOOCs? It’s usually delivered with a ‘Gotcha’ tone. The financial and
business models in education are complex. However, we can be sure of one thing,
the current University system can’t monetise itself. The whole structure is
propped up by state spending and huge loan books. MOOCs went out on a limb and
tried some new models and they should be applauded for doing so. In practice,
people do invest their time and money in taking MOOCs. Rather than being stuck
with the many thousands of dollars/pounds per annum plus living expenses, other
cheaper models are emerging that put less of a burden on the learner, parent or
state. Some one pays and the real question here is not just who pays but what
we should pay. Most areas of human endeavour have seen falls in prices, apart
from education which has been ballooning out of control. Beyond this Udacity
are promising a job or money back guarantee on their NanoMOOCs – how bold is
that?

9. Rethink role

This is a subtler point but I believe that the MOOC
phenomenon has uncovered an uncomfortable truth, that Higher Education is not
now the sole provider of higher education. As MOOCs moved out of their
traditional curriculum and pedagogic structures, they began to be produced by
other types of organisations,for
audiences outside of mindset of the 18 year old undergraduate. Oddly, the main
opposition to MOOCs comes not from learners or the public, but from those
within current institutions, who see MOOCs, not as progress but a threat to the
status quo. Higher Education will not suffer greatly from their presence but
the provision for higher education will be greatly widened as they play a
smaller role.

10. Rethink global role

MOOCs can be taken by anyone from anywhere in the world with
internet access. This has forced institutions to think more openly and
globally. A good example is the global partnership and transfer agreements
between Delft University, Delft
University of Technology, Swiss Federal
Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), the
Australian National University (ANU), the
University of Queensland, the University of
British Columbia, and Boston University,where students can
take MOOCs from several Universities around the world and have them recognised
by all in the alliance. Malaysia has announced that all of its state
universities will grant MOOC credits and allow transfer. The model is similar
to airline alliances and codeshare, where the passenger can book a ticket and
travel across an entire network to get to their destination. We will see more of this emerge
as gobalisation of higher education moves beyond one year swaps.

Conclusion

More than a rethink, I think MOOCs have forced many into a
reboot when it comes to the use of technology in learning. This is, in my view,
a necessary condition for progress in terms of learning, teaching, demand, pedagogy,
curricula, assessment, accreditation, culture, cost and role. The very idea of
Higher Education is being altered as we speak.

5 Comments:

I tried hard to find an element that I could disagree with... But Donald did an excellent job on all the points. Each bullet could be its own post. The "one hour" element, the asynchronous nature, are major disruptions to the classroom approach.The other tipping point are the larger smartphones that allow access to information anywhere at any time.Well thought out and thanks !!!

These are things that I'd very much like to see happen and I'm really glad that you're seeing them. From my perspective, in Australia, the large MOOC platforms are being run very much as niche projects and, whilst high profile, they don't seem to be having much effect on the way the rest of universities are working.

Having said that, there is plenty of smaller scale innovative work happening in pockets lower down organisations with self hosted open courses.